Domingo Soto: Because Freedom Isn't Dumb

Clear Channel "Redeploys"
The Mobile Register's story this morning is an interesting sidelight to a national debate about the loss of identity in radio.Clear Channel always figures prominently in the many recent discussions lately about the pablumization of radio. The standardization issue is seen by many as a form of corporate cultural imperialism, except that no one claims that it's driven by anything other than efficiency and greed.

The Register reports that listeners of a local Mississippi radio station were surprised Monday when they heard rhythm and blues instead of their classic country fare. Alabamans fared worse, they couldn't hear it at all since the company moved their transmitters westward to better serve Biloxi. WBUB (Bubba?) now is WBUV (?).

"It is really a Gulfport-Biloxi station now." general manager of Clear Channel Radio's Mobile operations David Coppock told the Register citing FCC regulations that limit the ownership of stations by one group and the temporary waiver that had allowed them to have the station thus far. Plans also call for divesting the company of a Pensacola station in order to keep the company withing the "constraints" of the FCC.